Chopsticks
by Ms. Issippi
Summary: In which Tsubaki trying to teach her friends how to use chopsticks ends in complete and utter failure.


**A/N: This piece is a bit informative, so you may learn things from it! I thought it would be fun to write this seeing as how I had to take a class on holding chopsticks properly a while ago and failed miserably. It's actually a lot harder than it looks, especially considering all the rules and etiquette you have to follow to simply eat food. Nonetheless, please enjoy!**

**I do not own Soul Eater****.**

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Tsubaki sighed for what seemed like the millionth time that day. In order to accustom her friends on Japanese culture for a trip they'd all be taking, she had offered to teach them respectful behavior while dining. She put down her own pair of chopsticks in front of her rice bowl and stood to help others hold their own.

As she showed Maka how to properly pick up and hold her chopsticks, she spied Patty out of the corner of her eye sticking her pair of chopsticks up her nose. She instantly dropped Maka's chopsticks and ran over to retrieve Patty's chopsticks from her nasal canals. Pulling them out, she quickly wacked her upon the head lightly with them. "No, Patty, do not shove them up your nose. As much as you may hate to admit it, there are no walruses in Japan. And people certainly do not respect honoring them at the dining table." She said, handing them back to her. Patty giggled, trying to hold hers again. Next to her, Liz grunted, frustrated. "Ugh, Tsubaki, these stupid things don't work!" She cried out, handing them to her. Tsubaki kneeled next to her and put them the correct way into her hand.

"All you have to remember is to hold them toward the end, not the middle or the front. It's as simple as that!" She said, standing after helping Liz with holding her chopsticks. She saw Black Star stick his chopsticks directly in his rice, standing up straight. She rushed over and pulled them out. "Black Star, of all people, you should know better!" She scolded, and everyone turned in her direction. "What's wrong with standing them up straight into the rice?" Soul asked, curious. Tsubaki handed Black Star his utensils back.

"Sticking chopsticks directly into rice is a sign of death. It's only done at funerals and it is considered extremely disrespectful. As well as passing food directly to another plate with your chopsticks. They do that with bones at a funeral." She informed, and the few who had their chopsticks in the rice took them immediately out.

As Soul started speaking to Maka, he waved his chopsticks around in the air. Tsubaki watched this for a while, seeing if Maka would say something. She did not, but instead, she started poking him on the head in anger with her chopsticks, and pointing at Liz, who was struggling to pick up some grains of rice. Tsubaki sighed once more and took the chopsticks out of their hands. "Don't wave them around as you speak. And don't point them at others." She said wearily, and handed the partners back their utensils.

Tsubaki went back to her plate and sat down, hoping she wouldn't have to get up again. She was paying no attention to Death the Kid, who was at the other side of the table and was not making a peep of noise, so she figured he was doing fine. Meanwhile, she caught Black Star telling Patty to spear her food if she couldn't pick it up with her chopsticks. Tsubaki glared at him, and Black Star told Patty that she actually shouldn't. As Patty began to get bored and play with her chopsticks, Tsubaki told her not to. Liz started chuckling, but then let out a frustrated grunt, throwing her chopsticks down on the table.

"Tsubaki, I'm holding them right, and these damn chopsticks refuse to pick up a single grain of rice! I'm holding them exactly how you showed me and I can't pick anything up." She complained, and Tsubaki returned to Liz's side to show her that as she was holding her chopsticks, her hand had started inching up toward the front and that's why she could not pick anything up.

Maka inched away her bowl with her chopsticks, but Tsubaki had reached over and pushed it back to its spot with her hand. Maka looked at her, confused, but Tsubaki did not look up from her meal. "Don't push around your plates with your chopsticks." She said simply, and Maka nodded, pushing it back with her hand.

Tsubaki looked up at Liz, who was picking up rice one grain at a time. "Oh, Liz," She said, and the girl looked up. "Before, when you put your chopsticks down, I thought you might like to know that you're supposed to twist your hand around the chopsticks so that it's at the bottom, place it on the table next to each other and right in front of you, and make sure that the tips are facing towards the left." She said, demonstrating it. Liz nodded. "Oh, okay. I just threw them down 'cuz I was mad at them." She said, and Tsubaki nodded, returning to her meal.

Tsubaki set her chopsticks down, and looked around. For the most part, everyone was struggling, but they were at least following the rules of dining. She spied over at Soul and Maka, Maka, who was doing quite well, and Soul, who was doing okay. She smiled. "Soul, do me a favor." She said to him, and the albino looked up. She pointed to Maka's plate. "Take a bit of Maka's rice." She said, and Soul smirked. "Sure, no problem." He said, taking his chopsticks and digging into his meister's food. Maka looked annoyed, and gave a questioning look to Tsubaki.

As Tsubaki observed the way Soul took food directly from Maka's bowl, she smiled. "Nope. Wrong." She said, and Soul turned to her, his eyebrows furrowed, "Huh? You told me to take her rice, so I am." He said. Tsubaki pointed at his chopsticks. "When taking food from another plat or bowl, if you've already eaten with your chopsticks, you have to flip them around so that the part you haven't eaten with is touching the other person's food." She said. He sighed, flipping his chopsticks the other way and taking rice from Maka.

Tsubaki smiled. Now that she had gone over all the basic rules of dining with chopsticks, there was no way her friends could fail!

Then, she took a look over at Death the Kid, who was focusing so intently on his chopsticks that he probably did not hear a single word of advice or was watching anyone else. He had one chopstick in each hand, between his thumbs, middle fingers and ring fingers. He was shakily picking up his rice one grain at a time, and it looked as if he had assorted his rice so that all the grains were facing forward. How he did that, she couldn't tell. But right off of the bat she knew that this would be a problem.

"Um… Kid?" She said, but the reaper did not look up from his grain of rice. "…Kid." She said, starting to get more annoyed. By now, everyone at the table was looking at his bizarre method of eating with chopsticks. Liz put down her chopsticks, and walked up behind her meister. She hit him on the head and shouted "Kid! Listen!" into his ear, causing everything to fall. Panicking, he picked up his chopsticks the same way and put the grain of rice straight before looking over at Tsubaki, chopsticks still in hand.

Tsubaki tapped her fingers on the table as Liz returned to her seat. There was a dead silence in the room except for Tsubaki's tapping, seeing as everyone stopped eating to see what would happen. Even Patty and Black Star were silent. "Kid… You know you're not supposed to hold them with both hands, right? You're… you're supposed to hold them like this." She said, showing him. He looked at her chopsticks and then his. Hers and then his. Repeat.

"That's…" He started to say, and Tsubaki nervously bit her lip and shut her eyes. _"THAT'S DISGUSTING! AWFUL! HOW CAN ANYONE BE SO UNBALANCED LIKE THAT, LET ALONE A WHOLE ENTIRE COUNTRY? WELL, I REFUSE TO TAKE PART IN THIS, THIS DISGUSTING FORM OF DINING! SO GOOD BYE AND GOOD DAY!"_ He said, placing his chopsticks down with force (while still being symmetrical) and storming out the door. Tsubaki's eyes were still shut, and silence still rang through the house.

One by one, the group members stood, and said good bye and thank you as they left. Tsubaki could still tell that they did not fully understand how to use their chopsticks. But she figured she'd just bring forks with them instead.

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**Thank you for reading and reviewing!**


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